Lost in the complaints about the science, plot holes, and characters in Interstellar were the complaints about sound. Patrons and professionals alike found that in many places, the score and sound effects left the dialogue unintelligible. Director Christopher Nolan decided to respond in a very Christopher Nolan way, by essentially saying, Exactly! He told The Hollywood Reporter, “Many of the filmmakers I’ve admired over the years have used sound in bold and adventurous ways. I don’t agree with the idea that you can only achieve clarity through dialogue. Clarity of story, clarity of emotions — I try to achieve that in a very layered way using all the different things at my disposal — picture and sound.”

“There are particular moments in this film where I decided to use dialogue as a sound effect, so sometimes it’s mixed slightly underneath the other sound effects or in the other sound effects to emphasize how loud the surrounding noise is," he explained, adding, "It’s not that nobody has ever done t...